Gaza Strip, Israel’s attack on Jabalya causes 90 deaths. EU capitals under pressure, truce negotiations reopen

John

By John

An Israeli attack on the Jabalya refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip killed 90 people. This was reported by the Al Arabiya television channel, citing the enclave’s Ministry of Health. The news was relaunched by the Russian agency Tass.
Earlier, Al Jazeera TV channel reported that the Israeli army bombed several houses in the Jabalya refugee camp. According to them, at least 30 people were victims of the attack and dozens were missing.

Meanwhile, international pressure is mounting to pave the way for “a lasting ceasefire” in the conflict between Gaza and Israel. London and Berlin have expressed themselves in favor of a solution that leads to “a stable peace” over time, while Paris, also underlining “the high number of deaths”, calls for an “immediate truce”. Tomorrow the defense minister will arrive in Israel Lloyd Austin uses the Biden administration’s request for “a new phase” in the war, more targeted on the leaders of Hamas and a reduction in attacks in the Strip. And optimism for a new truce with the exchange of hostages “even if there remains disagreement on the details” is expressed by Egyptian sources after, CNN reveals, the meeting between the director of the Mossad David Barnea and the Prime Minister of Qatar Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani “It was positive.”

The one who doesn’t seem to have any intention of backing down from the war, however, is the prime minister’s government Benjamin Netanyahu, strengthened, according to him, by a mandate from the families of the fallen to continue the conflict. The Wafa agency reported an Israeli air strike with “at least 47 Palestinians killed” in Jabalya in the north of the Strip and in the Deir el-Balah refugee camp in central Gaza. Precisely in Jabalya, Israel announced that it had found a Hamas tunnel in a children’s room, with a crib, in the basement of a building. And ohToday a mega tunnel system was also discovered for a length of approximately 4 kilometres at a depth of 50 meters, traced by Mohammad Sinwar, brother of Yahya, a short distance from the Erez crossing between Israel and the Strip. A tunnel used, according to the military spokesperson, for the attack on the border kibbutzim last October 7th. From today, humanitarian aid trucks entered the Strip for the first time from the Israeli Kerem Shalom crossing and this could improve a very difficult situation: a video released by AP shows hundreds of civilians attacking a food truck in Rafah.

AND the WHO returns to denounce the conditions of the emergency room of Al Shifa hospital: “it is a bloodbath”. For this reason, international pressure is increasing: the British foreign ministers David Cameron and the German one, Annalena Baerbock, in a joint statement they argued that we must “do everything possible to pave the way for a lasting ceasefire, leading to lasting peace. The sooner the better.” While clarifying that he does not believe that it is necessary to “invoke a general and immediate ceasefire now”. The French minister Catherine Colonna, who met with his Israeli counterpart Eli Cohen with whom he also spoke about the situation with Lebanon in order to reduce tension, instead sided for “a new immediate and lasting humanitarian truce”. Which leads to a ceasefire for the release of the hostages and allows humanitarian aid to the population of Gaza. Column from Ramallah, where he met the Palestinian National Authority (PNA), he also denounced “the violence of the Israeli settlers in the West Bank” which “undermines the prospects of a political situation”.

Prime Minister Benyamin Netayahu, however, rejected the pressure and he announced “a letter from dozens of families of fallen soldiers” in which his mandate to “continue the war” was confirmed. “This – he underlined – is the testament of the fallen and our obligation to the living”. While in Khan Yunis, in the south of the enclave, where there is the most intense fighting, the holiday homes of Hamas members were searched, including that of leader Yahya Sinwar, who hid weapons and tunnels.